Month: October 2008

Paul Blumenthal of the Sunlight Foundation poses the following questions: “The Alaska Daily News covers another aspect of the trial: what happens if Sen. Stevens is found guilty and then wins reelection? I have another question, what does the Senate Ethics Committee do if Sen. Stevens is acquitted?” 

Lets begin with the easiest question:  if Stevens is not re-elected, it is virtually certain that the Senate Ethics Committee will take no action, regardless of what happens with his trial.  Both the Senate and the House have long taken the position that they lose jurisdiction over a member once he leaves office.  There would be little time left for the Senate Ethics Committee to take any action against Stevens, even if it were inclined to do so.   

A more difficult question arises if Stevens is acquitted and re-elected.  In that case, the Senate Ethics Committee would be under pressure to take action, but Stevens’s lawyers and supporters would argue that the Committee should respect the verdict, not just of the jury but of the voters.  There is a strong tradition, in both the House and Senate, of declining to take disciplinary action against members based on conduct that was known to the voters at the time of their election.  Sometimes this principle has even been described as jurisdictional—for example, in the Fourth Congress a Senate Select Committee found that the Senate had no jurisdiction over accusations of fraud and perjury “alleged to have been committed before [the Senator’s] election to the Senate and were public knowledge.”  J. Chafetz, Democracy’s Privileged Few 221 (2007).  It is generally understood today, however, that this limitation is in the nature of a prudential restraint. 

This principle would certainly counsel the Senate Ethics Committee against recommending Stevens’s expulsion, but it is less clear that it should prevent the Committee from taking or recommending lesser action.  After all, the fact that the voters wanted Stevens to remain in the Senate would not necessarily mean that they want him to escape all punishment for his actions.  Moreover, even if the Committee chose not to revisit the jury’s findings with regard to false statements by Stevens, it could still consider whether Stevens violated Senate rules.  Indeed, even if the Committee accepted everything said by Stevens in his own defense as true, one could argue that it should find that his actions violated the letter and/or spirit of the gift rules. 

The most difficult issue is what happens if Stevens is convicted and re-elected.  While the principle of respecting the decision of the voters would weigh heavily against expulsion, there would also be a countervailing tradition that Members of Congress, when convicted, normally resign their offices.  If Stevens were not to follow that tradition, the Committee would have to face a serious question of whether to expel him. 

The most relevant precedent would seem to be the case of Senator Harrison Williams, who was convicted on bribery charges in 1980 after being videotaped agreeing to accept a bribe during the Abscam investigation.  The Senate allowed Williams to remain in the Senate for more than a year while he pursued post-trial remedies.  Some Senators thought expulsion was too harsh a remedy for Williams’s conduct.  Eventually, however, the Senate scheduled a vote on expulsion; Williams chose to resign before the vote.  As Dennis Thompson notes, “even in a case of almost pure individual corruption, it took unusually explicit evidence and confirmation provided by a criminal conviction to bring the Senate to the point of imposing its ultimate sanction.  In most cases the accused’s motives are less evident and his colleagues’ judgment less severe.”  D. Thompson, Ethics in Congress 105 (1995). 

Based on the Williams precedent, it seems likely that Stevens would not be expelled at least until he had exhausted his post-trial options.  If he was at the point of actually going to prison, however, the Senate would presumably expect him to resign.  If he failed to do so, at that point the Senate would most likely proceed to expel him.

           My last post discussed how the Stevens jury may be confused about the definition of a “reportable liability.”  Today I will discuss a significant ambiguity in the jury instructions themselves.

           

            The instructions reflect the fact that Stevens is charged with failing to report both gifts and liabilities.  But nowhere do the instructions state, at least explicitly, that these are alternative theories.  In other words, the indictment alleges that the various things of value Stevens received were either gifts or liabilities.  A single thing of value, however, cannot be both a gift and a liability. 

            The jury instructions obliquely address this question.  There are eight different instructions (Nos. 32, 43, 45, 51, 53, 55, 57 and 68) that deal with the need for the jury to reach a unanimous verdict.  These instructions fall into three different categories.  Instruction No. 32 deals with Count One, which alleges that Stevens concealed material facts on his financial disclosure forms (FDs) for each year from 2000 to 2006.  The instruction states that “[i]n order to find that the government has met its burden to show that Senator Stevens concealed a specific alleged gift or liability, you must unanimously agree as to the specific gift or liability that Senator Stevens concealed and the specific Financial Disclosure Form on which the alleged concealment occurred.”

Instructions Nos. 43, 45, 51, 53, 55 and 57 deal with Counts Two through Seven, each of which alleges that Stevens made a false statement on his FD for a particular year from 2001 to 2006 (Count Two deals with 2001, Count Three with 2002, etc). Each instruction states “[i]n order to find that the government has met its burden to show that Senator Stevens made or caused a false, fictitious or fraudulent statement or representation when he filled out his [year in question] Financial Disclosure Form on [date in question], you must unanimously agree as to the statement or representation that was false, fictitious or fraudulent.”

Finally, Instruction No. 68 covers all counts, and states: “In order for your verdict to be unanimous, you must all agree that the government proved each element of each offense beyond a reasonable doubt. Senator Stevens has been charged with seven counts of making or causing false statements on his Financial Disclosure Forms. For some of the counts, the government has alleged more than one statement or representation, or more than one gift or liability. However, in order to return a guilty verdict on any count, you must unanimously agree on the specific false statement or representation and the specific gift or liability that Senator Stevens allegedly failed to disclose on his Financial Disclosure Form.”

I think I understand the rationale behind these instructions, but one can easily imagine the jury being confused as to the different and apparently inconsistent verbiage used. Presumably, though, the jurors will get the message that they must agree on both the particular thing of value Stevens should have reported and the year in which he should have reported it. In other words, it will not do if the jurors agree that Stevens should have reported Item A, but some believe that it should have been reported only on his 2004 FD and some believe it should have been reported only on his 2005 FD. Similarly, it will not do if the jurors all agree that Stevens should have reported something on his 2004 FD, but some believe that he was only required to report Item A and some believe that he was only required to report Item B.

It gets a little murkier, though, with respect to whether the jurors must agree on whether a particular item was a gift or a liability. Suppose, for example, the jurors all agree that Stevens was required to report Item A on his 2004 FD, but some believe that it should have been reported as a gift and some believe it should have been reported as a liability?

Read closely, it seems to me, the instructions for Counts Two through Seven require that the jurors agree on whether the particular item is a gift or a liability. This is because, as the jury instructions state, Stevens made separate “statements or representations” on each FD with respect to gifts and liabilities. If some of the jurors believe that Item A is a gift and some believe it is a liability, they would be unable to agree on which statement or representation was false and thus could not reach a unanimous verdict.

But what happens if the jurors who believe Item A is a gift also believe that, if it is not a gift, it is a liability? Or if some jurors believe that Item A is definitely either a gift or a liability, but are not sure which? It would seem that unless the jurors unanimously agree, beyond a reasonable doubt, on whether Item A is a gift or liability, it is logically impossible for them to agree on whether Stevens made a particular false statement or representation for purposes of Counts Two through Seven.

Count One may be different, though. That count does not charge Stevens with making a false statement or representation, but with concealing material facts. It may be that the jury could unanimously find that Stevens concealed a material fact, ie., his receipt of Item A, while they disagree as to whether Item A was a gift or a liability.

Maybe I am missing something (or maybe this is just the way the criminal justice system works), but it seems like asking an awful lot of the jury to puzzle this out on the instructions they have received.

 

           According to The Hill, one of the questions asked by the Stevens jury this week involved the issue of reportable liabilities.  The jury’s note to the judge asked him to “please clarify the liability cost as it is not readily clear in the Senate regulations.”  It is interesting that the jury would be focused on liabilities, since everything I have read about the trial has dealt only with the question of whether Stevens received reportable gifts, and has not mentioned either evidence or argument on whether Stevens had reportable liabilities. 

            The judge evidently interpreted the jury’s question as meaning “what dollar amount triggers a reportable liability?”  While this may be the most natural reading of the note, it is difficult to believe that the jury was confused on that point.  Both the “Senate regulations” and the jury instructions (Instruction No. 66) make it crystal clear that the trigger is $10,000.  If the jury doesn’t understand that, it is in real trouble. 

            Perhaps the jury is confused about how it should determine whether a liability is more than $10,000.  Or perhaps it is confused about how to determine whether something is a reportable liability in the first place.  The jury instructions do not provide any guidance on this, apparently leaving it up to the jury’s common sense.  The jury’s note, moreover, suggests that it has been given copies of the “Senate regulations” (presumably referring to materials such as the Senate Ethics Manual and the instruction booklet for financial disclosure) and that it is trying to interpret these regulations for itself. 

            This strikes me as problematic.  It would seem that interpreting the meaning of the term “liability” under the financial disclosure statute is a legal question for the court, not a factual question for the jury.  In particular, as I have noted before, it is not at all obvious that an unpaid and unbilled debt for goods or services constitutes a “liability” within the meaning of the Senate rules.  It should not be up to the jury, but to the court, to make the determination of whether the term “liability” extends so far.  Moreover, to the extent that the Senate rules are ambiguous on this point, even the court is prohibited, under separation of powers principles, from interpreting them.  The jury’s statement that the Senate regulations are not “readily clear” may itself provide ammunition to the defense for post-trial motions and/or appeal. 

            In the meantime, whatever the jury’s question, it will apparently have to muddle through without help.  According to The Hill, the judge ultimately decided not to provide it with an answer.

 

             

          For those interested in the Stevens case, the Anchorage Daily News has posted the jury instructions.  

            One issue that the jury instructions deal with is the relevance of public disclosure to the case.  As discussed by Taxpayers for Common Sense, the defense argued that the duty of disclosure to the public is irrelevant because Stevens is charged with violating the False Statements Act, which applies only to false statements made to the government, not to the public.  The prosecution argued that the duty of public disclosure is relevant to the case because one of the purposes of the financial disclosure requirement is to inform the public.

           

            Jury Instruction No. 65 says: “You have heard reference during the trial to a public interest in disclosure.  Senator Stevens is charged with making false statements to the government, not to the public, and public disclosure is not an element of the charges in this case.” 

            My first reaction to this instruction was that appeared that the judge had accepted the defense’s position.  On reflection, I guess it is not so clear.  The defense wanted all references to public disclosure stricken.  This instruction says that public disclosure is not an element of the charges, which is clearly correct, but it doesn’t say that the duty of public disclosure couldn’t be considered for other purposes (like motive or intent).